Philip Hammond: The Chancellor previously told the House that he could not publish the letters from the Governor of the Bank of England and the chairman of the Financial Services Authority because although the Governor agreed to his letter being published, the chairman of the FSA did not agree to his letter being published. Question 4 asks him to publish the Governor's letter. Will he ask the chairman of the FSA if he has any objection to the Governor's letter being published, and if he does not, will the right hon. Gentleman give the House a commitment that he will publish it?

Angela Eagle: One-to-one support is being funded in the comprehensive spending view. I might ask the hon. Lady what her views are on ageism in the work force, given her comments earlier.

Angela Eagle: I am more than happy to visit my hon. Friend's constituency to see the great work that is being done. The Government have funded a renaissance in apprenticeships. There are now 250,000, and there were only 87,000 when we came into power. We have further plans to create 500,000 by the end of the comprehensive spending review period. Those apprenticeships offer fantastic skills and opportunities, none of which were available during the era of mass unemployment when the Conservatives were last in power.

Andy Burnham: I shall let my hon. Friend speak for himself.
	The Conservative party have to be a bit careful with the figures. Let us be clear about what the estimates are. They are notional figures that relate to all future payments that will have to be made over eight decades. The hon. Lady's colleague, the shadow Chief Secretary, told the  Sunday Mirror last week that that will mean that
	"Every family in Britain will pay £33,000 to fund the pension promises he has made to public sector workers."

John Barrett: Will the Leader of the House find time to debate the situation in Bangladesh,. where not only have 3,000 people died, but with rising sea levels and climate change, up to 30 million people could be at risk in future? The debate would be appreciated by the House and by the Bangladeshi community. There was a 30-minute debate last night, for which no Department for International Development Minister was available. I should like to see the Secretary of State for International Development taking his place in that debate.

Linda Gilroy: This will be a very sad day in Plymouth, which has one of the factories listed for closure, where 35 people currently work. I understand that 21 of those people are looking for alternative employment, and I hope that they will soon join the 93 who have been found employment locally since April this year in local Remploy services alone; there are a lot of other help services in Plymouth. It has already been agreed that four or five of them will go to Pluss—a sheltered workshop that has, by diversifying, done exactly what Remploy should have been doing all these years. May I invite my right hon. Friend, along with my hon. Friend the Minister with responsibility for disabled people, to visit Pluss, to give assurances that there will be employment and places for all those 35 people, and to see how that award-winning factory operates so that he can draw on that experience when he works with Remploy to take these matters forward?

Frank Doran: May I first congratulate my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State on his statement? It was an extremely difficult statement to make, as hon. Members and hundreds of Remploy employees today had the final confirmation that their factory is to close. I am in the fortunate position that the factory in my constituency, the Aberdeen Remploy, is to be saved. My right hon. Friend did not read out the list, but I hope that it still is.
	My right hon. Friend made a number of references to changes in management. That is crucial. One of the most serious criticisms of the way in which Remploy has been run concerns the quality of the management. Management needs not only to be cut, but to be improved, too. Extremely difficult targets have been set, and I for one do not want to be here in three or four years' time after we have gone through another similar process.
	Remploy management have been particularly deficient in centralised purchasing, as the hon. Member for Edinburgh, West (John Barrett) mentioned. Since we launched the campaign to save our Remploy factor in Aberdeen, we have encountered a huge response from the local community and local businesses. "Local, local, local" is a strong marketing tool.

David Lammy: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention. Of course I congratulate the young people in her constituency for all that they have achieved.
	I start with a quotation from Sir Terry Leahy, the chief executive of Tesco:
	"I am a huge fan of apprenticeships because I have seen what they can do for individuals and also what they have done for my business."
	Many top business leaders in this country share that conviction. It has been my great privilege over the past few months to travel the country visiting employers and apprenticeships, from meeting sheet metal workers in Huddersfield and seeing the recent launch of the media apprenticeships with the BBC in Manchester to seeing apprenticeships last week in Birmingham and talking to electricians in that area this week. Apprenticeships are vital and employers say that they are important to their productivity.

John Hayes: I am coming on to that very point, and I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for reminding me that I need to do so swiftly.
	As has been implied, the problems I refer to have been exacerbated by the programme-led apprenticeships that were introduced in 2003, which enable apprentices to begin their training at a college or training provider even though they have yet to secure a work placement. A survey by the adult learning inspectorate found that colleges were to told to rebrand learners as apprentices simply because they were working towards qualifications which were also part of the apprenticeship framework. Overnight, the number of apprentices increased by more than 30,000, yet only 3,000 of them actually progressed to a full apprenticeship with a work placement. That was sleight of hand, and it diverted attention from a fact that has been raised: fewer people are currently studying for traditional work-based apprenticeships at level 3 than when Labour came to power.
	The Government's own figures— [Interruption.] It appears that the Under-Secretary is looking aside for guidance from his officials. I suspect, however, that he knows very well that the Office for National Statistics figures—I am happy to give them to him before the wind-up, if he wishes—show that the number of level 3 apprenticeships has fallen by 34,000 since the turn of the decade. A graph in a House of Lords report— [Interruption]—which my hon. Friend the Member for Windsor (Adam Afriyie) has to hand, confirms that data, and it is neither fair nor reasonable to pretend that the growth in level 2 numbers compensates for that fundamental weakness at level 3. Lord Leitch identified it in his comprehensive report, the House of Lords report identified it, and the Government's own answers to written questions confirm it.

Christopher Chope: I am with my hon. Friend absolutely on that. That was why I thought that yesterday's threat by the Prime Minister of imposing minimum wage legislation on apprentices' employers was a damaging development. The dictionary definition of "apprentice" that I cited makes clear that an implicit aspect of being an apprentice is taking a lower wage to reflect a lack of experience and skills. There is a partnership between an employer and an apprentice under which the apprentice agrees to learn and work on the job, and the employer gives his time freely. Obviously, however, the employer cannot afford to give the apprentice the full wage that he would pay to someone who was fully qualified.

Michael Connarty: I have heard so much about general immigration policy from the Opposition Front Bench that I wondered whether the Conservatives had read the Green Paper or the Government's response before they tabled their amendment. They seem to have tried to push enough in to make the amendment credible. In reality, however, they seem to be agreeing entirely with the Government's submission on the Green Paper. But perhaps they did not read it.
	The point of the European Scrutiny Committee sending this document to the House is partly to illustrate the service that we believe we provide to the House in summarising important and complex documents, recording the Government's view of them—all of which are available for people to read—and allowing the House to debate the issue. We need to debate the issue, but not to pile into the debate anything that the Conservatives might want to use to pad out their speeches. We have had much padding from the Opposition today. This debate is about asylum and about the Green Paper from the Commission on asylum. That is quite specific; it is not about immigration, border controls or anything else. It is about how we deal with people who eventually reach an EU country and apply for asylum.
	The 1999 Tampere European Council agreement established the aim of working towards a common European asylum system. That is clearly something that the Opposition may wish to resist, and that would be a valid point for them to make in this debate, rather than all the other things about general immigration that they threw into the mix. The first phase involved putting in minimum standards for the reception of asylum seekers and procedure for considering their applications. It was decided at Tampere that, in the longer term, there should be a common asylum procedure with uniform status throughout the EU for people being granted asylum.
	The Council of Ministers has put forward and adopted four directives and three regulations since 1999. At the end of 2004, the European Council invited the Commission to value the existing legislation and proposed legislation to implement the second phase by 2010. There might be serious points of contention about that. The Green Paper deals with this issue.
	The Green Paper was issued in June 2007, and it asks that we should introduce common standards. It also talkes about mandatory rules. This would mean that asylum seekers would be treated equally and that standards of protection would be fairer and higher. The Government, and the Opposition, would say that, in principle, those are good aims. None of us would wish anyone who had genuinely fled from a threatening situation and come to this country or any other part of the EU as an asylum seeker to be treated any less well than anyone else, although there are suspicions that some of them are not treated well enough at the moment.
	Many people are allowed to stay in this country after suffering incarceration. Sadly, more than 60 children are incarcerated with their families in Harmondsworth at the moment. Thank goodness that, in Scotland, we have driven out that terrible blight on our society by not having asylum seekers' children in Dungavel. I was happy to be part of the leading group that convinced the Government that it was not a good idea to make that rule binding in Scotland because it would have breached the Children (Scotland) Act 1995. In fact, believe it or not, this country actually takes a derogation from the UN convention on the rights of the child so that we can lock up the children of asylum seekers. That is an appalling situation under any Government, but it is an even more terrible shame, sadly, under a Government whom I support.
	The Green Paper invited some views on more equitable sharing among member states of administrative and financial burdens and on assessing asylum applications. It went as far as putting forward the idea of actually sharing the physical burden by redistributing people across Europe if too many people landed in one country. In the example given, Spain was overloaded with west African asylum seekers. It is possible that in the Commission's vision of the long-term future, those asylum seekers would need to be redistributed throughout Europe.
	More effective EU support for developing countries is another theme. People flee countries that are near points of conflict and then go beyond them to the next country of safety, ending up in Europe. In fact, it would be possible to provide support for countries that are located alongside violent areas or areas where there are threats of violence. It might be possible for people to be supported to stay there rather than be driven forward and end up being trafficked. As the hon. Member for Ashford (Damian Green) accepted, people sometimes pay their life savings to get dumped on an inflatable dinghy in the middle of the ocean.
	We also want more practical data co-operation between members and views were sought on improving the EC's capacity collectively to participate in international agreements. There is some criticism in other parts of the world that we are not doing as well as we could in that respect and we are encouraged to respond to it. That was the Green Paper.
	We are happy that we are having this debate now because the Commission had a public hearing on 18 October. It will now move forward to presenting a policy plan, which is what the Government responded to and what our debate is all about. Quite frankly, at this moment, I am not sure that much has been said on the Floor of the House that will help to develop that policy plan.

Michael Connarty: The conflation of the Schengen agreement which emerged from Amsterdam and the asylum decisions at Tampere is completely false. The Schengen agreement involved conditions that we are steadily opting into, and—particularly in relation to information transfer—we are the keenest on its implementation. SIS I, the first Schengen information system, has not been implemented as we wished it to be, but SIS II is now being introduced. I believe that the way in which we are inserting ourselves into the Schengen process is justifiable, given the great benefits that we will gain.
	The Tampere proposals on asylum are different. They do everything that was done by the Dublin agreement, which allows people to be returned to the country where they first applied for asylum. That provision was a major breakthrough, and we use it again and again. We have made progress in securing right-of-return agreements with other countries from which people have come and applied falsely for asylum, which is fundamentally important.
	There is no open door in the United Kingdom. My hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow (Mr. Gerrard), who has intervened several times today, has many constituents who feel abused by the strictness of our asylum-seeking process. But I know of many cases in Scotland of people who, having been incarcerated and threatened with expulsion, were eventually granted the right to stay when a reasoned view was taken about the conditions that they had left and the danger posed to them should they return. Is that not what we are about, as a civilised nation? Is that not what we have been about for many years?
	I am reading a book the first word of whose title I cannot use because it is unparliamentary, but the second word is "foreigners" and the second begins with B. it is an excellent study of emigration, and of people seeking asylum who add to our community. For hundreds of years waves of people have arrived here: the first wave of Jewish people driven here before the pogrom, the Huguenots driven out of France and the Irish driven out of Ireland by poverty and starvation, followed by the second wave of people from the Jewish nations, driven out of Russia and elsewhere before the war. All those people have fertilised and grown on our island in a very, very positive way, but each time they arrived there was xenophobia. The same phrases were used about the Italians, the Irish and the Jewish people when they came here, and they were used about the Huguenots when they came. We keep doing it, and I am sorry to say that the Opposition Front-Bench spokesman and some of his supporters are doing it again now.

Michael Connarty: Not yet.
	The amendment is predicated on an argument about emigration into which as much as possible could be thrown to frighten the people However, our Government have been seen in some quarters—such as Positive Action in Housing, which campaigns in Scotland—as being far too tough on people genuinely seeking asylum. The idea that we should retreat behind a barrier and say, "This will always by something we do at UK level without co-operating with anyone" is frightening.

Tim Farron: As we have already heard, the common European asylum system seeks, most notably, to prevent asylum shopping across Europe. For example, under an effective common asylum system, people seeking asylum in Germany would not be able to present themselves for a second time in another EU country such as the UK.
	The structure created by the common asylum system demonstrates that the EU can be a serious force for good in reducing the number of asylum claims to the UK. That must cause significant mental discomfort to those Members for whom the words "Europe" and "asylum" are triggers to start snarling and frothing at the mouth. It must be hard for them to discover that one is the best mechanism to deal with the other. In any case, it is not my job to provide psychological support to the Conservative party.
	The Green Paper introduces stage 2 of the common European asylum system. To an extent, the Liberal Democrats agree that it is too soon to move ahead with stage 2 before we have judged the success of stage 1. We cannot yet judge whether what was agreed is what has been implemented.
	I would be interested to hear from the Minister the extent to which she thinks that Dublin II—a regulation that enables the sharing of information to prevent asylum shopping around the EU—is working in practice. There are doubts that it is working well, and those add further weight to the argument that we should concentrate on getting stage 1 right before proceeding to stage 2.
	Nevertheless, the Green Paper deserves proper scrutiny, as it raises issues that are relevant to the Hague programme as it moves forward. Although the Government are right to say that we should not rush to judgment, they should not use that as an excuse to ignore the Green Paper and the serious issues that it raises. For example, it gives us the opportunity to consider again whether we should allow asylum seekers to work. The Liberal Democrats take the view that asylum seekers should be permitted to work if their claim has not been decided within two months. It is not only inhuman to prevent asylum seekers from working, but is a drain on the benefits system and causes serious social problems.
	I do not mean to stereotype, but asylum seekers are often among the most enterprising and talented people. Of the asylum claims I have dealt with—my constituency is in the lake district, so I have not dealt with as many as some hon. Members—most have come from professional people, including doctors, nurses, teachers, and other people who have the skills for which we are crying out, and the desire and the work ethic to go out and earn a living rather than sit and wait for a decision, living on benefits. Many of the more right-wing newspapers to which the Government are often keen to pander are apoplectic at the thought of asylum seekers claiming benefit, so why not silence them by allowing asylum seekers to earn a living?

Dominic Grieve: The hon. Lady has made her point, and I am not going to get involved in an exercise in semantics as that would not be helpful.
	I think there might be agreement that, as the hon. and learned Lady said, the rise in rape is not a result of stranger rape, or people being dragged into the bushes or knocked over the head in a darkened lane at night, but in large measure results from the fact that people are properly coming forward and complaining about rape in the context of a relationship where they know their assailant. As the hon. and learned Lady acknowledged in her speech, that presents a real challenge, and we in this House must address it. First, we must ask how we can ensure that women who have been raped come forward and make allegations when we know—this is a telling fact—that many such women are in some uncertainty as to whether the allegation they wish to make constitutes rape. In many cases it almost certainly does—that point was picked up in Government statistics. We must also address how to ensure that that happens while also ensuring that there is fairness for the accused, and how to get such cases through the courts so as to ensure the conviction of those who are guilty.
	That is a very real challenge because all the evidence suggests that there are two major reasons why conviction rates are so low. First, a substantial number of the cases complained of never reach court at all. It is worth running through the statistics on why that is the case: one sixth of the complaints initially made are not investigated because the police conclude—one hopes they are right in this—that they are false; a quarter are dropped because of insufficient evidence; and one third are withdrawn, often because the victim will not co-operate further, which presents another challenge that should cause us a great deal of anxiety. We also know that once such cases get into court, the nature of the allegations presents juries with enormous difficulties. They must decide whether a very serious offence has been committed, and if the person accused is of previous good character and the consequence of conviction is a long period of imprisonment—as it should be—if there is any doubt, the defendant is entitled to the benefit of it. We have seen over and over again that such cases present real problems. It is worth noting that the conviction rate in such trials is now 44 per cent., and although that is too low, as the hon. and learned Lady has said, it is substantially higher than the initial statistics would suggest.
	I must also say that it is not my professional experience that jurors treat rape allegations lightly. Rape is viewed in our society as a very serious matter, although I agree with the hon. and learned Lady that there might be issues about young people's attitudes as to whether certain sorts of behaviour may render a subsequent complaint by a victim in some way wrong—I think we are in agreement that we would not wish to countenance that.
	What should we do? My right hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Mr. Cameron) has made the point, which has been picked up, that greater support for rape victims is needed. It is worth pointing out that there were 68 rape crisis support centres in 1984 and there are only 45 today. There are funding issues in respect of whether the centres can survive in the long term when they tend to have a hand-to-mouth existence. I very much hope that the Government will be able to address that. As the hon. and learned Lady will be aware, we have said that the three-year funding cycles are unsatisfactory.
	I think that there is also complete common ground between the hon. and learned Lady and me on wider educational issues. It is vital that there is an understanding within the sex education context of people's rights in intimate relationships. That should be inculcated and fully understood at a young age, because in the long term that might do more to reduce the incidence of rape than almost anything else. I hope that the Government will have the opportunity to look—we will support them in doing so—at ways in which to take that forward.
	We also need to consider whether we are getting the right sentences, although I acknowledge that the Solicitor-General says that some of the statistics show a continuing rise in sentences in rape cases. That is also a difficult area, but if the Government make any suggestions, we will consider them creatively.
	I turn to the issues raised in the report. I note that the first recommendation is that the Government take the view that there is no need at present to interfere further with the law on capacity, and they are right. We carried out a major change in the 2003 legislation and, while I share the Solicitor-General's disquiet about the problems with several cases in which the judiciary and, sometimes, prosecuting counsel did not seem to understand the new rules, any form of legislative change takes time to be transmitted down the chain. I am pleased to hear about special training for those prosecuting such cases.
	I am sure that the Solicitor-General will agree that the case of R  v. Bree has laid down clear parameters on the issue of capacity. I hope that those are properly understand and that, as a result, we will have no further instances of trials being abandoned even though the issue of capacity could be resolved in the jury's mind. I endorse the judiciary's assertion in R  v. Bree that it was certainly not Parliament's intention to say that a person lacked capacity only when they became unconscious, and I am pleased that that has been made clear.
	I find the second issue, that of expert witnesses, more difficult, and I shall explain why. I was struck by the Solicitor-General's comments, because her language about a desire to see expert evidence admitted or special training for juries was much stronger in tone than the contents of the Government's response in the report. I do not know whether that indicates some difference of view between the Solicitor-General and others in the Law Officers' Department or the Home Office about how to approach the issue, or whether it is her personal view. In any case, one does not match the other, and I detected considerable hesitation in the report, insofar as it made it clear that there were potential problems with getting expert evidence admitted, which the Government fully recognised. I share those concerns.